“The United States does not torture”

Susan J. Crawford, a Reagan Administration veteran (General Counsel to the Army) who then went on to serve as the chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces and whom the Bush Administration put in charge of the military commissions, seems to have joined “the left wing of the Democratic Party” (per Dick Cheney). Let’s make her welcome.

Dahlia Lithwick and Philippe Sands point out that under the Torture Convention, every state has a treaty obligation to criminalize torture, and to prosecute torturers itself or extradite them for prosecution elsewhere.